Tag: Monday Mutterings

It was almost like moving to a new place of employment – a new job – a new place to find my spot in the pecking order.

For several years now I’ve been involved in a group – a singing group – in other words a choir. For a while there I needed something to make me ‘happy’ and discovered a music group and associated choir. I was in heaven. Some time to myself (if you could be by yourself surrounded by other voices) making a noise and feeling good.

We met once a week, in the evening about a half hours drive from home. Their repertoire was a bit like the Ancient and Modern Hymn Book – some new, some familiar, some old yet modern enough for me (and most of the others) to know all the words.

When I joined we were led by a fabulously ‘young’ musician who had studied a whole range of styles and methods both here in Australia and abroad and like many students of classical music also had his own jazz band (on the side) 😊 He had a way of making us feel we’d achieved something special. Then as he put it – his career and studies were getting in the way and he just couldn’t spare the time as little as it was, so he had to move on. Sighs all round – we need to find a new conductor

So after a long lead in time we found what we thought was a good choice for a conductor. Very different in that she is more dogmatic in her ways, my way or no way. This is what I want and expect you to provide. With the ‘you’ being mostly mature age people who go (yes to learn, but also to have fun) numbers dropped quite quickly – yet were expanded by others (from other groups) wanting a ‘leader’ who thought that way.

Of course I was away interstate over a lot of the winters so didn’t have to contend with those 30 minute drives in whatever weather turned up. Some winters I was a bit crook so didn’t go – didn’t want to infect others or couldn’t sing what with coughing a lot or not having a voice lol

As the season began to change it was getting to the point that I was finding excuses not to go – but I really missed it.

So earlier this year I decided to do away with these self conceived problems _ a dominant almost unyielding leader plus an unwelcome night time drive – and joined the ‘day group’. The organisation only has one group that meets in the daytime – in Camberwell. Miles away from home – 45 minute drive or 30 mins on the train (plus time to and from the station and a walk down Camberwell Road to the hall) so about an hour door to door.

Honestly, as I mentioned above, I thought it was going to be almost like taking on a new job. Like finding the right spot to sit in the hall……. with the Altos, yes but on which chair? What time is the break, where is coffee served?

First discovery was the friendliness of the others. There is no pecking order. None of this…. we’re sopranos – you’re altos – and never the twain shall meet. Oh and the men are over there.

With two helpful ‘assistants’ and a vibrant ‘witty funny’ conductor who keeps all that under check, there is a style of leadership that means you can’t help but follow directions because you want the song to sound great. The voices blend together, harmonise like magic with no one type overpowering the other. It’s almost like the first point in ‘The One Minute Manager’ – People who feel good about themselves produce good results!

Yes it’s a bit of a trudge on a Tuesday morning especially these really cold ones but guess what – I’m enjoying my singing again and being happy and feeling good inside myself is all that matters (to me at least)

Has anything been bothering you recently that you found a solution to?

What about your fears and worries – did they disappear or were they realised?

It’s all to do with my homesick kilos. They leave home for quite a while then decide to move back in again I really need them to move out permanently!

Because of them this how I feel – Very big

Just like this wide load seen on a country road during one of our trips to Queensland 😎

I was beginning to think those pesky little Cs could have been the problem so I asked Maxine what the answer was 😊

You’d never guess what……it seems the answer was right under my nose……I’d been using shampoo in the shower as soap! Don’t laugh but it seems I should have been using washing up liquid instead! Well we learn something new each day 😊😊

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There are lots of ‘community clubs’ around the different suburbs here in Melbourne – they are a bit like the local hotel/pub in that a liquor license is involved but that’s where the similarity ends. This one is fairly local to me

All would have a bistro serving meals most of the day and evening, a lounge and bar as well as snacks and coffee bar service, TAB outlet complete with big screens to watch several different sports, lots of entertainment and of course a ‘gaming room’ full of poker machines (and free coffee!)

Some people think they are nasty immoral places catering to ‘poor unfortunate souls with a gambling addiction’. Others think of them as a club where they can go to meet friends during the day, have a drink or a meal in relative comfort and not go near the pokies.

More upmarket ones will also have a courtesy bus pick up and drop off service which allows members and their guests the pleasure of being able to drink (within reason) and get there and back safely without the hassle of drink drive regulations. And getting there in a comfortable mini bus is a boon to older members who don’t drive so they will ‘drop in’ more frequently.

Win win – happy customers- more profit for the club.

Melbourne has just hosted a Food Truck Extravaganza in the city – loads of mobile kitchens serving different varieties of food all the one spot. It would have been fun but unfortunately we couldn’t get there. Imagining all those vans travelling the suburbs sent me off in search of something I’d often wondered about, something my imagination runs riot at the thought of…… MOBILE WOOL SHOPS or YARN TRUCKS.

Wouldn’t it be great to have a van draw up and park outside your door offering all sorts of lovely coloured goodies. You could ooh and aah to your hearts content over all the new stock without the hassle of going to the shop. There is loads of information on the net and loads of images showing just the thing I visualised however they seem to be a big thing in parts of the United States but not here in Australia.

Look at this …..isn’t it eye catching with those huge great big balls of wool on the roof. Imagine that out in the street. I wonder what the neighbours would say about that 😊😎

Well this brightly coloured van isn’t quite what I thought it was.

Remember those courtesy buses I mentioned above…….that’s just what this is….. A courtesy bus to take you to the wool shop.

I reckon a free ride across New York in the Flying Fingers YarnBus for a knitter would be like a ride in a fire engine for a child. Great fun if you could get it 😊😎

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Now what on earth could a map of the Melbourne suburban train network, a very large box of chocolates, a swimming pool and this little girl have to do with commitment ?

This little girl (aka our quiet one) was snapped on her sixth birthday proudly showing off the (natural age related) gap in her top teeth and the cast on her arm caused by a tumble from her bike trying out the ‘activity track’ her older brother had put together in the back yard. A determined little devil she was – and still is. She became a scout and having achieved their top award The Scout Medallion she then moved on to Venturers where she worked towards and received the Queen’s Scout Award from the Governor of Victoria

Not long after that she became a Rover and now at nearly 21 still enjoys the ‘rough and tumble’ but also working hard on her Baden Powell award has the maturity of someone involved with her community. Determined and committed !

Anyway back to last week

Our quiet one works in hospitality in an inner city suburb. So with not much – well, no – parking nearby she uses the bus from the end of her street to the station and then train and trams to get there and back and up until now she’s usually been able to get a lift (or the bus) home from the station. A couple of weeks ago her mother (our little girl) and her father went up to Queensland for a bit of a break, then her aunt (our big girl) and her sister (our little redhead) joined them for a week and because there were no ‘ family taxi drivers’ around and having several evening shifts down on her rosta Grandma committed herself to meeting the late trains.

And late trains meant 10/11 pm ones arriving long after our very local bus service had stopped running!

Having a daughter (our big girl) involved with the parent company of Cadburys with her office located in the Bayswater factory grounds giving her access to the ‘shop’ – you know the place where for very low prices they sell all the seconds and other associated goods – sounds like fun?

Yes, it was fun for a long long time but not these days – except when she brings a really really good bargain to her father’s eye.

Now The Golfer and I are is partial to chocolate so 5kg of unwrapped badly shaped small picnic bars for $5 was received from her with open arms before she went off to enjoy a week in the sunshine with her sister. Seeing that large box and knowing what it contained made me all the more committed to restarting those morning visits to the pool.

I can tell you that a week of early mornings at the pool coupled with late nights waiting at the train station made for a very tired (but committed) Grandma.

ps I did a swap with our quiet one – the day I bagged up and gave her some of the chocolates she surprised me with a gift of flowers 😊

pps Is it alright to have one little bar of chocolate Maggie – I’m sure pool work will help with the BP and the calories 😎😊

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A touchy Internet connection for the best part of last week meant little if any blog browsing for me. I’d find something interesting and lose it so a fair amount of knitting was done to compensate. The Golfer took me out to lunch and we finally got some rain, they were a plus – someone decided to let their car get up close and personal with my little Lance 2, which definitely was a minus.

Oh how I’d really like a larger storage cupboard in the laundry because I had to pop out to the garage really really early this Monday morning aka today to retrieve a 12 pack of loo rolls and shivered in my shoes. All thoughts of replacing the empty pack went out the window yesterday as the rain came tumbling down – definitely wouldn’t want to have to revert to this though.

My family immediate never did but I vaguely remember my granny in Belfast had an outside lav/loo looking very much like this.

The cooler temps this morning meant it was out with the short sleeves and iin with the long as well as a rummage through the wardrobe last night for some lightweight jeans to wear to my volunteer ‘job’ this morning.

I laughed years ago when the volunteer coordinator at the nursing home said, ‘You don’t have to be dressed to kill, just neat and tidy. Some of ‘our ladies’ will not be backward in coming forward to tell you what they think of your dress style. True to her word one resident (who, sadly not with us now, had previously been a hairdresser and also owned a clothing shop) would always pass a compliment on my hair or one item of clothing. She would also be known to suggest when it ‘might be time for a trim’

So still reeling from the unfolding details of the ball tampering scandal enveloping the Australian cricket team I went off to spend the morning encouraging some of the oldies to remember tunes they would have been familiar with in their younger days. We are getting closer to the mid 1950s music but still feature songs from the early 1900s and WW1 era because some of the ladies are well on their way to 100. There’s something about seeing a person close their eyes and mouth the words of a song yet be unable to hold what many would (unfortunately) describe as ‘a sensible conversation’ that makes me realise the powerful effect music has on the mind.

On a lighter note I found this article last night on what is definitely a first world problem- what clothes are most comfortable to wear on a long haul flight

From there it was a 30 minute drive to the crash repair business in Knoxfield to leave Lance 2 in their capable hands. Obtaining the other parties details meant the excess on our part was waived – and I got a ‘free’ ride home in a taxi. Here’s hoping it gets done in the time quoted, not sure how I’ll cope….. or should I say we’ll cope……if I have to wait until after the Easter holiday. Another first world problem 😊

And of course the first thing I remembered when I arrived home was I should have popped into the shops to pick up some vegetables for dinner so it ended up being a seek and you might find ‘what’s left in the freezer’ meal.

Pumpkin soup found hiding down the bottom accompanied by garlic bread also lurking in the bottom. Followed by…..wait for it….tinned creamed rice (a old comfort favourite of mine) with the last of what might be the last of the strawberries from the farm near the golf course and a dollop of strawberry jam.

Coffee with one of those lovely dutch almond fingers finished off my very cheap….but not nasty…Monday night meal.

The other news during the day has been the cold snap that has brought early SNOW to the High Country. Mt Buller is just over a 2hr drive from my house- no wonder it was cold!

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Like it or loathe it Reality TV shows are here to stay. There’s a whole swag of them that appear in various forms each year…….Cooking – Home Renovating – Relationships…..I’m sure you all know what I’m talking about.

Even though I have other things I could be doing AND as much as I hate to admit it I often start to watch one and ‘get hooked’. Just one mind you!

This year it has been ‘Married at First Sight’ (MAFS) where experts pair couples of various ages together in an experiment involving a mock marriage followed by time together with the expectation that they could ‘bond’ and maybe decide to carry on the relationship after the show has finished. Yes – a load of rubbish some say, yet it can be intriguing to see human nature play a part as the weeks go by.

You see how the needs and wants of these couples come into play, most of them are good talkers and can express their thoughts to the cameras (which follow them on this journey) there are good ‘guys’ wacky ones, quiet ones as well as emotional ones and there are also the ‘bad’ ones 😊

Very early this season much to the horror of the experts two of the ‘contestants’ were dissatisfied with their ‘other halves’ and seemed to take a fancy to each other. In other words unbeknown to their partners they carried out a bit of romantic suggestive texting with each other and then had a little rendevous (all filmed of course) and then when the facts became public knowledge to the others the man sort of backtracked denying he had anything to do with it, he’d been pursued by the other woman, really liked his wife. Oh the excuses were flowing.

Several other things happened that he was involved in eg loud sexist ‘boy’s night’ talk where the beer is flowing freely (all filmed of course for the tv audience’s enjoyment) On screen his wife’ accepted protestations of things being misinterpreted, accepted the benefit of doubt, all his shortcomings as well as his declarations of ‘love’ …….even though a lot of the others (and people on social media) warned her off him.

Anyway last night, after a week away from each other in order to gather their thoughts together so they could make their final decision, they came together in the middle of a very desrted paddock for the last commitment ceremony – supposedly to declare their to each other and then state whether they……as the producers hope……would continue to see each other.

Dean was very wordy ….and persuasive …as he did just that.

Then Tracy said her piece telling him quietly and very politely it was not to be – he betrayed her several times and all this recent display of ‘love’ was too little too late and he didn’t deserve her.

She then exited stage right and he still displaying feelings of entitlement was walking round in circles crying like a baby. Not happy at getting his just rewards!

Oh, let us enjoy this season we said, the year will begin all in good time!

Then all of a sudden

it seemed like we’d been lined up at the starters gate for quite a while

Australia Day came and went – As did the start of the New School Year

And that’s when the starter’s gun went off – loud and clear

Since then it’s been go go go 😊😎

Last week the oldies in the Nursing Home who had missed the fun and games of their Musical Memories activity gave it their all (well all that they could remember), my choir had its first weekly rehearsal of the year, and talk at the first monthly book club get together for the year was about the oodles of books everybody read because it had been too hot to do anything else. A busy day today began at the nursing home encouraging the residents who take part to exercise their brains by identifying the MM songs, then after picking up some books at the library designated for a February reading challenge I stopped talking about it and popped into the LeisureCentre to renew my gym membership.

It’s back to the pool tomorrow morning with the first meeting for 2018 of my local CWA Branch in the evening. A Ladies Probus meeting on Wednesday morning followed by an assessment for a new exercise programme. Thursday the new (to me) charity knitting group I mentioned a while back has their first gathering of the year so I’ll drop in to say Hello.

We have a new boundary fence going in some time this month so I’ve got some time earmarked to be spent clearing more of the fenceline on Friday. My ‘tricky back’ means it can only be done in drips and drabs as I don’t want to be pencilling in visits to my lovely chiropractor on the calendar 😊

Then of course in the third week of the month there’s the mixed Probus group starting up again after the summer break as well as my VIEW club lunches .

Yes it sounds to me as if the Year Proper has finally begun.

Some people warned me I’d be bored stiff when I retired. I’d miss the contact I’d had with the public all my working life. Ha Ha don’t think there’s any chance of that happening. Yet I’m very careful to make sure that tucked in amongst all these ‘voluntary commitments’ there is oodles of quiet time set aside for me to enjoy life.

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There are so many ways to communicate with others these days
Instagram – Twitter – Facebook – Blogs are just a few

And this is where I start a post with no idea of
where I’m going or where I’ll finish.😊

I do have accounts on all of those with minimal……in fact no…… personal information apart from a photo in my public profile. You’d probably glean a bit about me from reading the blog avatar.

My personal fb account was to allow me to join craft (and other) groups, a few family and friends ‘found’ me and apart from newly discovered extended family (discovered via family research sites) I don’t go around asking others if I can be their ‘friend’.

Anyway about a year ago I kept getting ‘friend requests’ on this account – the odd thing was these were from strange men as well as male members of armed forces (soldiers sailors airmen – in uniform with rank displayed) Obviously those requests were deleted.

Then the same thing happened on twitter – a medium I used for a while for various reasons but haven’t looked at for well over a year. Lots of messages saying ‘so and so is now following you’ Once again strange men, many with no tweets recorded but following loads of women Oh and also those new followers included women whose profiles described them as ‘se^xy’ looking for fun! It took a while for me (not the most tech savvy person) to find the way to block them, unfollow people and sites I no longer had any interest in and to decide to make the account private.

Now you’d think instagram would be harmless wouldn’t you. Well you should see some of the people who decided to follow me. Honestly I haven’t shared a photo for goodness knows how long but these ‘strange’ men and women seem to like looking at Kiera lol More time spent looking for how to block them, unfollow a lot of people and make that account private.

Then there were the strange ridiculous and at times confronting comments that were arriving on the blog. They came in clusters thankfully stopping for some reason towards the end of last year. Luckily they didn’t all make it onto the blog proper- w/press scooped them up as they arrived and put them into spam folder for me to decide yea or nay.

So after an end of year break I start writing on Still Waters again and blow me down if I don’t start getting emails informing me – ‘people with very strange names @ outlook’ – have become followers. I consulted the help forums and lo and behold I’m not the only one getting them………WordPress were aware and were trying to (not sure what) do something about it.

I then discovered a feature available in the settings of my w/press blog There is a way to remove/delete followers. You learn something new every day 😊

I thought it was only the other party who could do that – you couldn’t block a follower.

So armed with this knowledge I went through my followers list checking their ‘credentials’ and deleting an enormous amount. Most of whom were unknown to me. People who hadn’t blogged for years, people whose blogs were closed/deleted, bloggers from online courses never to be heard from since, others from ‘financial’ sites or travel places – you know all those people who follow because you wrote about something once (but never again) I will admit to feeling a bit better once that had been done and of course if I’ve removed a live reader they can always refollow.

OK everyone, come on and help me here. Am I the only one to have gone through all this rubbish – was I naive in thinking all those things couldn’t happen to me? For a while there I even wondered if my name had been entered on a dating agency’s books 😊😊

Public blogs are like open jars of jam waiting for nasties and other strange things to fly in and ‘spoil’ the taste so I can’t complain.

However I’m curious to know about other people’s experiences with followers on those other sites.

It’s early Monday morning, and as is usual I’m sitting here with coffee pondering about my life in general.

A beginning of the year coffee morning with my group of ladies brought the usual observations from some about ‘another year down, wonder how many more there will be to come’ Late last year the oldest lady was really down in the dumps, a bit like my friend B she had lost family and friends during 2017 and the passing of time was beginning to get her down.

At the moment she seems to have put that all behind her because over coffee last week she had us all in stitches relating snippets of fun from her big family Christmas get together where her youngest grandaughter had made a model of a time machine that would roll back the years and ‘make Nanny happy again’.

Like a lot of us in the group she’s been here in Australia for many many years yet is the only one who still talks about her life in England. Think of that she said, I can go back to living in the little village where we all knew each other, there was a corner shop (who delivered) and a greengrocer, the post office was in the front room of Mrs What’s Her Names (having trouble with her memory at times is my friend 😊) Oh and lots of other good things I can’t quite think of at the moment.

One of us laughed and said it sounds a bit like the village where Milly Molly Mandy lived with her Mother and Father in the same little cottage as Aunty and Uncle along with Grandma and Grandpa. Another said, don’t forget Billy Blunt, little friend Susan and Toby the dog!

Of course some of the younger ones had never heard of the little girl in the striped dress or the books a lot of us had read in our childhood so out came the phones so they could find out.

After that it was Reminisce Central at the table with talk of all those trades who delivered to the door – mobile shops! First and foremost there was The Coalman! Then the milkman and his horse later overtaken by electric carts, the baker who came with a big basket on his arm, a greengrocer who had a van with sides that lifted up to display all the fruit and veg. I mentioned we had a fish and chip van and a long Co-op grocery shop that came once a week similar in size to some of the mobile libraries seen on the roads these days

We might have to keep our eye on our ‘elder stateswoman’ – well into her 80s and not a computer or mobile phone owner – we began to wonder if she had been ‘taken in’ by her grandaughter’s time machine when some of the younger ‘girls’ were talking about ‘this new invention called online shopping’ as she calls it. It would be lovely to have things home delivered she said but I would miss having a chat with the man behind the counter in the corner shop!

But then always the joker in her younger days I wonder if maybe she hadn’t been ‘taken in’ but was just pulling our leg 😊

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There’s one little sound that seems to have infiltrated most of our world.

THE BEEP

I’d like to know what we did wrong to be inflicted with the beep – I’d love to know who invented the beep – ‘cose I’d certainly give them a piece of my mind

Not the bad word beep and not the reversing beep not even the ping beep of a low smoke alarm battery beep but that infernal one thats heard around us more and more these days – the one that seems to be attached to everything electonic.

The Golfer has been party to the beep for a long time now, I resisted for a lot longer whilst smiling at all those around me who were slaves of the beep

Sadly progress wiped the smile off my beepless face – our trusty 25 year old beepless microwave packed up a few years ago and I reluctantly joined the beep society. There is nothing attractive about a microwave that beeps at you – and I have been known to tell it so across the kitchen. Its almost like someone snapping their fingers and expecting you to drop everything and attend to their needs – doesn’t happen in my house lol

It doesn’t seem many Christmas have passed since I fell more and more under its spell – the beep that is – I entered a new phase of my life…….late bloomer that I was ……by becoming the owner of a small mobile phone – yes, up till then if ‘they’ wanted to talk to me ‘they’ had to wait till I was ready to speak to them.

I have since progressed to a bigger (whether it’s better is open to debate) thing that still beeps (in a slightly different key) when ‘they’ decide they really need to ask me something or let me know something, knowing full well my curiosity will get the better of me and I will stop what I’m doing to find out what it’s all about.

Oh dear, and you know what…..another wedge was driven into my desire for a beepless life when the new fridge/freezer was delivered and had the audacity to beep at me when I stood at the open door pondering.

And then not content with just finishing a wash and coming to a standstill – guess what the new washing machine did, yes the beeping thing beeped at me!

I’ve had enough………I’ve decided I’m going out to protest……I’m going to stand outside the electrical stores with a placard……a large one …….one that says Ban the Beep! 😊😊

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Recently there’s been far too many of them lying around- loose ends that is

I could have titled this ‘tidying up’ or even ‘finishing up’ but ‘sewing up’ will do because that’s what actually ended up happening 😊

The loose ends were those hanging off the *WsIP (*works in progress – technical term for unfinished stuff 😊) I finally managed to get off my needles this past week or two.

Do you know that after years of thinking about it I’m positive my parents should have given me Procrastination as my middle name instead of that belonging to my granny in Belfast because lots of ‘gunnas’ get muttered in my house……I’m gunna do this – I’m gunna do that……..trouble is things get put to one side and it takes forever for these gunnas to get done.

Anyway I promised (when I had time) to show a non commenting friend, who regularly reads my mutterings, what I’ve recently put into ‘the knitting box’ ready for next year’s winter charity drive. She also reminded me (because she forgets half the time when I physically tell her) to make a note of the patterns I’ve used. Well there’s not a lot to say about the patterns – One is quite old – the other more recent (still in print I think) – they are guidelines only because I don’t always follow them 😊

The little v necked one above is a go to for me – simple to knit with good clear instructions, the eyelet pattern illustated is good for a little girl. However I made these two below using the directions and sizing but adding a stitch here and there to accommodate the broken rib in the yellow and the fisherman’s rib in the fawn.

This Woolworth’s book from the 1960s is my standby for a couple of other woollies ( no pun intended 😊). The shirt pattern looked easy and as the little boy wearing the knitted shirt was a dead ringer for our first born I bought the book – but never ever knit it for him lol There must be something about me and collars because when I finally knit it for a nephew the collar wouldn’t sit right so I changed it to a round neck instead.

I had a bit of the fawn left over from the ribbed cardigan so combined it with the orange/green vari yarn to come up with this version. I tend to think of this style as being boyish so find it looks better in ‘boy’ colours – if there are such things 😊

And as I’m sure you realised, once these were popped in the box it was out with the needles, new balls of wool in hand and we were off and running again. There’s a rerun of the pinkmatineecoat (the good bit that is) going on and the blue teddyjumper as well (maybe the clown and koala as well) so I’ve enough to keep me occupied for a while.

~ ~ ~ ~

I seemed to have talked on a bit there so maybe ‘you’d’ like to tell us what’s just come off your needles or maybe what’s still on your needles needing to be finished

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Row Row Row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily Merrily Merrily Merrily
Life is but a dream

I’ve been plodding along living my life peacefully this past few weeks. The days are getting longer, lighter earlier and staying light a bit later each day and even getting a (tiny) bit warmer. Warm enough some days for open doors and windows and even – not have any heating on 😊

Not warm enough for salads yet – still a bit of stewing going on

All of which means I’m slowly emerging from my winter hibernation, starting to paddle about, leave the house willingly and actually enjoy being out and about.

With the arrival of better weather I’ve returned to choir after a break during those cold wet weeks – night driving in the wet was beginning to worry me so best not to do it. I missed that weekly sing song so if we ‘winter at home’ again next year I’ll try to tee up with someone and arrange a lift. No chance this year – locals close to me were either away or crook Our ‘flu season is still going strong, thousands have been struck down with several unusually young ‘healthy’ deaths. So I’m not sure if it was due to our ‘flu jabs or good luck the virus didn’t strike either of us.

A trip to the cinema last week to see Victoria and Abdul meant we were finally able to use the balance left on a gift card from last Christmas – the cinema at Chirnside Park has lots of little theatrettes so we thought it might be fun to mix and match…..two visits in the standard but very comfortable $10 seats and two in the more upmarket recliner $15 ones 😊

The Golfer decided on American Made & Dunkirk – La La Land along with Victoria and Abdul were my choices. So many ‘fabulous’ reviews for V & A and I’m probably in the minority here but it was a bit so so for me. A truish story line, beautifully set and wittily acted but it didn’t seem quite right.

Honestly this change in seasons seems to have filled one of my friends with a sense of the ridiculous – she had me in a fit of giggles as she entertained me at lunch the other day.

Some of our supermarkets are having facelifts and installing these carousels to hold the plastic bags. As one bag is filled the cashier gives it a turn and starts to fill the next one, after a few turns the bags reach the customer who then lifts them off and puts them in their trolley. It appears the young cashier didn’t quite see the funny side when B asked if she could have a ride on the roundabout. B is well into her 80s and not quite the slimmest of people!!

And then when she returned from visiting the “ladies’ she asked me how long there’s been a gents urinal over the lavatory pan. With no idea what she meant I had to go and have a look. The café had installed one of those water saving sets – a new special handbasin over the cistern unit. Push the button to flush and the water comes out of the tap draining into the cistern – there’s no plug and it’s a regulated fill amount (same as any cistern) no need for a separate sink unit. Only drawback I could see was washing your hands with cold water and remembering to put the lid down. Wouldn’t want to lose a watch or bracelet while leaning over to get to the sink.

And I certainly seemed to be living in a dream the other day.

Put a load of washing on – came back expecting it to be finished – yes I’d put it on but didn’t close the lid (top loader) which meant it got as far as drain and spin then stopped. Safety feature – doesn’t spin with the lid up. Senior moment all right 😊

Didn’t help I’d been up to our local supermarket (one without the wiz bang plastic bag carousels) and as the young lad who was serving filled each bag he actually placed them straight into my trolley. Now that’s never happened before – they get usually filled and put on the shelf beside the till for you to pick up.

When I said Thank You he replied – “I thought you looked rather weary today so decided you’d be my ‘good turn for the day'” I wasn’t sure if I should be pleased or upset – he really did do me a good turn but did I really look that tired and weary??

So how are you all?
Have you been merrily rowing down the stream of life?

Can you do several things at once or are you a one thing at a time person?

Are you able to concentrate with loads of things going on around you or do you need peace and quiet to hear yourself think?

I need quiet to do bookwork and certain crafts yet if I’m in the car I need the window open to hear the other traffic so I can concentrate on the road and know what’s going on around me.

If only the person driving two cars behind me had remembered that definition* the other day as we were approaching a red light – before giving me the fright of my life by slamming into the back of the car between them and me. Quick thinking by the driver of the middle car meant he swerved slightly and missed me by a whisker!

It’s Monday and I’m still muttering about it!!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Cross stitch is a craft that needs my undivided attention – otherwise I end up miscounting I should learn from experience it is hard to concentrate when The Golfer is nearby and in a ‘silly mood’ 😊

Come the winter Kiera concentates on giving the fire her undivided attention 😊

Isn’t childhood concentration a joy to behold. Here’s one of our sons aged about 3 lining up cars and blocks completely oblivious to all about him.

I’ve been back on the family history trail again this past week. Delving into census can be really interesting because as well as giving an idea of family size and circumstances it also provides information on occupations.

I was talking about this with a friend and for some reason the talk turned to our first jobs and how all the things related to those jobs that had sounded so easy were in the beginning so hard to grasp. (You have to remember this was quite a while ago when the office junior was given what girls these days might think were menial things to do). Anyway one of her duties was to make tea/coffee for ‘the bosses’ and she had me in stitches as she recalled that simple task and all the mistakes she made. ‘You’d have thought I was a dumb blonde (her words) instead of someone with high marks in all my secretarial studies’ she said!

And all this leads up to a couple of Blonde Jokes I came across the other day 😊

The Blonde and the Census Taker

The census taker rang the doorbell and was greeted by an attractive blonde woman. He explained he was from the Census Bureau and wanted to know how many people were in the family.